Plutarch: On the Face which Appears in the Orb of the Moon: Introduction, Edition, English Translation, and Commentary to the Critical Edition

In Plutarch: On the Face which Appears in the Orb of the Moon, Luisa Lesage Garriga offers a new critical edition with English translation of one of Plutarch’s most fascinating treatises, and yet one of the least known to the wider public. Dealing with the nature and function of the moon from multiple perspectives, this treatise offers a comprehensive overview of scientific knowledge and religious-philosophical thought from the first centuries CE. The difficulty of Plutarch’s style, the shortage of manuscripts, and the numerous text-critical interventions have often obscured the meaning of central passages of the treatise. By means of a new approach to the manuscripts’ readings and a more lenient use of editorial interventions and conjectures, Luisa Lesage Garriga manages to bring innovative solutions to many of the problematic passages.